today’s project: curtain rod in the bedroom

This and That

Sounds simple, right? Just get some command strips and cheap hooks, and put it up there.

My prowess with a screw driver has never been one of my listed skills, and I hate following directions. I don’t need no stinking directions! Why do they have to be so talkative? Just tell me what to do and I’ll do it. Prepare the surface with alcohol? Really? Why: the walls are clean? And why not put the stick-up hook up over the old anchor things that remain since before the painters removed all the nails and fixtures.

Once the hooks were up there, the search for the blue curtain panel I have began. Of course the panel is not where I thought it was, and I refuse to buy another one. I wanted blue, but what the heck, I’ll settle for a nice gray sheer that I had. Then I spun the folded panels in the dryer, and loaded them on the curtain rod. Moved out the bed, and situated the step-stool, put the rod across the hooks, and voila! all that needed to be done was fix the gathers and it was done. I stepped back to admire the curtain, and the rod came crashing down. Back to the drawing board…

I’ll do it right next time, instead of giving the job a lick and a promise. Look at the directions 😉

censorship or common sense?

Books and Reading, Commentary, opinion, Sometimes, This and That

During my work in trying to reduce the volume of books from my inventory, I have thought a lot about censorship. I hereby state unequivocally that I have always been against censorship, and the current hysteria at certain school board meetings in our nation grates against my position. Having been a news reporter back in my day, I attended some pretty wild school board meetings. The parents who would show up to protest (almost anything) to do with teaching, teachers, or education in general. My favorites were objection to requiring girls to wear special gym clothes, which were always ugly; the great brew-ha-ha about students smoking; the length of boys’ hair; and the frantic issue of expelling pregnant girls from school.

So anyway, I won’t belabor the subject and cut right to my current thoughts.

I have a great number (several hundred) childrens’ books, most of which came from two of my main inventory sources, who were school teachers. I have decided not to donate “all” of the books to the Goodwill because of the current censorship craze some places in the United States. I also don’t want to list multiple-lots of random childrens’ literature, or even grade-level non-fiction or series books (I think they call them chapter books now.) Also, I do separate the occasional book that even I would prefer kids not have access to. Even these I would classify as “age appropriate.”

Six-year old girls don’t care about “how Susie got her boyfriend” but 11-year-old’s might. That’s what I call age-appropriate, but even that is subjective, and I am not comfortable deciding who gets to read what, and I would never in a million years support any legislative or otherwise action that would entitle random outraged parents to close down a board meetings.

Now when it comes to general fiction, or non-fiction, that’s another thing. When I come to certain titles that I believe to be subject to …let’s say… “parental supervision” I set them aside— no, never into the trash, just aside to be reconsidered or duly noted as a listing on ebay. I hasten to add that I never list any material that I consider porn, and on occasion a girly-magazine hidden in a Woman’s Day collection will hit the trash, censorship bedamned.

experimenting and commenting on various and sundry technical frustrations

This and That
This is a pic of the last Lily of my meager crop of 2022. The photo is edited for the purpose of honing in on ruffles and ridges, and shadows, which altered the shade of the green foliage. The browning of the leaves was I think due to the excessive heat and dryness. I’m no gardener of any note…nor photographer either. I do like to experiment with photo editing skills, though, and the purpose of doing this post and the previous one of the purplish bloom is to try to find an easier way to transfer photo from post image. When I had my system malfunction a couple of months ago I replaced my computer with a refurbished one I ordered online. It’s a good one, except for a few differences in US and UK systems. (Such as the absence of an @ at-sign, and occasional other items.) It also came with only a basic Windows version, and I had to install all of my programs myself which took some doing. My photo programs also took some reinstalling, as there were a lot of technical quirks that had to be worked out. I use Windows Photo which is very good, and I like to experiment with FastStone, which offers some features that I really like. One of those tricks involves a direct photo capture and transfer direct to WP and other applications. I suspect that my own fumbling with photo work is to blame, I always tend to make a BFD out of everything. (Big Fat Deal)

… on red cars and other observations

This and That

I have always been partial to red cars. My first car, a beat up old 1938-something Chevy, was a dark maroon, and the next several cars we had were not of my choosing. When I reached the point of actually deciding what color I wanted, red won hands down. Well, except for my blue chevy pickup.

One of my weird obsessions is counting red vehicles on the road, or in parking lots. That includes not only passenger cars, but trucks and miscellaneous vehicles of all types. Rather subjective when it comes to classification, all shades of red count, but not purple or orange. There have always been lots of red cars.

However, it has come to my attention lately that there is a great increase in the number of black, dark grey, and unidentified drab colors. Waiting at a long traffic light recently I amused myself by observing that the opposite bound traffic looked like a Mafia funeral. The entire line of oncoming vehicles were black or very dark. Not a red one within my line of vision.

The main “other” car color seems to be white. as contrasted with the usual array of light grey, beige, tan, silver. Blue also seems on the rise, and yellow! School bus/taxi cab yellow—and orange!

What dreary highway intersection wouldn’t benefit from some strategically placed touches of color?

my blue bird of happiness is a baby jay

This and That
This young bluejay was temporarily trapped in our garage for a day and a half before he managed to escape. He hopped back and forth among the rafters, but couldn’t figure out how to fly out the door. I provided a dish of water and some bread crumbs on top of a tall bookcase for the bird, it was very hot in there. The apparent Mama visited several times to escort him out of the garage. I always think it a privilege when a wild creature spends some quality time with me.

books, mice, and bluejays

This and That

This morning I’ve been sorting books to go to the Goodwill. There has been a baby Bluejay up in the garage rafters crying for hours. Now Mama Bluejay has showed up, so they are both flying around up there. The big garage door is open, and so is the man-door on the side, and now that I have left the scene, and my cat Dottie came in also, maybe the jay will be able to figure out how to fly out.

Speaking of Dottie, she is an in/out cat, and she usually comes in at night. She brought a mouse with her a day or so ago. I saw the little thing laying belly-up on the kitchen floor, so I grabbed some paper towels and picked it up carefully so I could toss the carcass out the back door. But omg as I gingerly gripped the creature in the towel, it woke up (I assume…I thought it was dead) and tried to escape. My reaction of course, was to scream. I hurled the mouse out the back door, paper towel and all, and haven’t had the nerve to inspect the still-there paper to determine its fate.

The book situation is slowllllly downsizing. The thing is, the books came from actual physical shops I had at one time, and the inventory has been culled at least once. It is sacrilege to me to throw a book in the trash, no matter how bad it is condition-wise. The Goodwill will not take encyclopedias, no matter how good they are, so I have them piled here and there waiting to be disposed of. If I was not such a good person, I would just slip the boxes of encyclopedias and other textbooks into the Goodwill cart outside when they aren’t looking…but I wouldn’t do that. 😉 I also clean each individual book as I pack them in boxes to be donated, and try to avoid passing on any book I think is unfit for children. I don’t mean porn, but those “Romance” novels can have pretty racy covers… I do not believe in censorship of information, but I do believe that some material should not be available to youngsters without their parents’ knowledge.

Back in the day my Dad used to glance at my reading selections. There was a book that he did object to, and asked me not to read it. I not only read it, but I had to really study it to determine just what Dad thought I shouldn’t read. I never did find out what content in that book he didn’t approve, but I know that it wasn’t about race, or gay people, or whatever. (I did not know until I was a married adult that any “whatever” hanky panky even existed.)

lilies july 6

This and That

Here are some shots of my Daylily patch. I apologize for the raw nature of this post, I really intended to post just a couple pics. They aren’t cropped or otherwise edited. My excuse is that since I installed my operation to my new/old computer…a really nice refurbished Dell, but its taking awhile to get moved into the new mainframe. Nothing seems to work as I intend. Guess I’ll have to do some studying. 🙂

These are my original plants from long long ago. They have been moved twice since they were new from the grower. The Lilies themselves are gorgeous…very prolific. There are more colors that are yet to bloom, and I haven’t been over to the side yard where the septic system is located. There were some nice white ones last year. The weeds are also doing well this year.